Mar 28

 

 

 

Mar 28, 2021   Week: 14    Day:  87          

Visibility: 10 miles

Ave. Sky Cover: 5%

Local: H 48°\ L 24°

Nearest Lightning: 1167mi.        

Wind:  4mph/ Gusts:  15mph

Moderate Risk of Fire: Active fire:  318mi

Record: 70°[2015]  Record: -7°[1975] 

Mar. Averages: 53°/23° (6 days with moisture)

 

Today’s Quote

Avoid popularity; it has many snares, and no real benefit.

~William Penn

Random Tidbits

The oldest known recipe is for a 4,000-year-old beer made by the Sumerians.

Sumeria's neighbors, the Egyptians, built the pyramids under the influence. Workers at Giza received about four liters of beer a day, according to Patrick McGovern, a biomolecular archaeologist at the University of Pennsylvania.

A Little Something to Think About

If you can drink a drink, why can’t you food a food?

If a writer writes and a speaker speaks, does a grocer groce, an usher ush, and a haberdasher haberdash?

True Things

A Georgia teenager eased his pandemic lockdown boredom by building a roller coaster in his family's back yard.

Ben Tolliday said the lack of activity amid the COVID-19 pandemic left him feeling bored, so he spent three weeks constructing a roller coaster from wooden beams, PVC pipe, cinder blocks and sandbags in the back yard of his family's Sandy Springs home.

Tolliday said he was confident in his work, but his first ride on the completed coaster was tense.

"I was absolutely terrified. But I guess because I built it, I knew how sturdy it was. So, I was pretty confident I'd be OK, but I was screaming my head off. It was crazy," Tolliday said.

Tolliday's mother, who took a ride on the coaster in a video the teen posted to TikTok, said she enjoyed the ride, but she'll be happy when it's gone.

"I'm looking forward to getting my yard back. I've got some plants trying to grow underneath. Yes, this is not going to be a permanent fixture in my yard, I can tell you that," Katherine Tolliday said.

The teenager, who will begin college in the fall, said he is now considering a career in the roller coaster business.

"That would be my dream job, to build stuff like this for people and then see their reaction when they go down it for the first time. Yeah, I had so much fun building it," he said.

Weekly Observations

 

Lent [Christian]

Passover [Jewish]

Thru 4/3

Thru 4/4

Passiontide

21-4/3

National Cherry Blossom Festival Link

20-4/10

Wellderly Week

21-28

National Physicians Week  Link

25-31

Holy Week
International Phace Syndrome Awareness Week
National Cleaning Week

24-4/3

 

Today’s Observations

Barnum & Bailey Day
Endometriosis March Day 
Link  
National Black Forest Cake Day

National Triglycerides Day  Link
Palm Sunday  

Respect Your Cat Day

Something on a Stick Day

Weed Appreciation Day

 

My Sometimes-Long-Winded Thoughts

No clouds, slight wind, a nice day for a walk. After several days of clouds and snow, this is a great and the snow has mostly soaked in!

When I was teaching ESL at Jr. High, we discussed many of Beverly Cleary’s books. She passed yesterday at 104.

Looking at history, the Roaring 20’s followed the horrific flu epidemic. While there was a lot of happy times, many Americans were left behind struggling in cities and rural area across the country. The stock market was, back then, reaching unbelievable highs as the rich just got richer. The market and the country crashed in 1929. Our leaders in business and government need to review their history of that era so the same mistakes are not made again. We should all review that history before voting.

In their emergency session yesterday, the Flagstaff City Council voted unanimously to uphold the mask mandate in our little town. This will probably end up in court, since our Governor is all knowing has ended all state, county, and city mask mandates.

Daily Puzzle

Answer: bottom of the page

The “Monty Hall” problem was made famous when it appeared in Parade magazine’s “Ask Marilyn” column in 1990, and it was so counterintuitive it had everyone from high school students to top mathematical minds questioning the answer—but rest assured, the solution is accurate. Named for the Let’s Make a Deal game show host, the puzzle goes like this: You are given three doors to choose from, one of which contains a car and the other two contain goats. After you’ve chosen one but haven’t opened it, Monty, who knows where everything is, reveals the location of a goat from behind one of the other two doors. Should you stick with your original choice or switch, if you want the car?

Historical Events

1920 – Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford got married; it was the first high profile celebrity wedding.

1930 Turkish cities Constantinople and Angora change their names to Istanbul and Ankara.

1949 – Fred Hoyle coined the term “Big Bang” in a radio interview.

1960 – Stanley Kramer was the first to get his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame

1964 (Earthquake) Alaska – the 8.4 on the Richter scale quake killed 125 people.

1979 – Three Mile Island Nuclear Disaster happened when a pressure valve in the Unit-2 reactor at Three Mile Island failed to close.

1990 – President George H. W. Bush posthumously awarded Olympic athlete Jesse Owens the Congressional Gold Medal.

2009 The first cases of H1N1 swine flu in the United States occur in two people in California.

2013 Pope Francis becomes the first Pope to wash the feet of women in the Maundy Thursday service.

2017 US President Donald Trump signs Energy Independence executive order undoing Obama climate-control measures.

2020 US President Donald Trump makes grim projection that 240,000 American could die from COVID-19, even with restrictions in place

Birthdays Today

@81 – Marlin Perkins, American zoologist, television host (d. 1986)

@64 – Frederick Pabst, German-American brewer, founded the Pabst Brewing Company (d. 1904)

66 – Reba McEntire, American singer-songwriter and actress

51 – Vince Vaughn, American actor

40 – Julia Stiles, American actress

@37 – Raphael [Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino], Italian painter, architect (d. 1520; ‘exhaustion from romantic endeavors’)

35 – Lady Gaga [Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta], singer-songwriter, actress

Puzzle Answer

You should switch. At the beginning, your choice starts out as a one in three chance of picking the car; the two doors with goats contain 2/3 of the chance. But since Monty knows and shows you where one of the goats is, that 2/3 chance now rests solely with the third door (your choice retains its original 1/3 chance; you were more likely to pick a goat to begin with). So, the odds are better if you switch.

 

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Flagstaff, Arizona, United States
I retired in '06--at the ripe old age of 57. I enjoy blogging, photography, traveling, and living life to it's fullest.